Baseball Bugs

Classic 1946 Freleng cartoon which has Bugs being taken up on his offer to beat the Gashouse Gorillas singlehanded, which he does. The basic plot, and seemingly some of the animation, was re-used for the Robert McKimson Bobo short, Gone Batty (1954).

The cartoon is clearly set in New York City since the game supposedly takes place at the Polo Grounds, the great Manhattan stadium that was once home to the New York Yankees, Giants, and Mets baseball teams. (The stadium was torn down in the mid-sixties.)

As in Boulevardier from the Bronx (1936), director Friz Freleng seems to have considerable trouble keeping baseball scores tallied correctly. Before Bugs fills in for the Tea-totallers, the scoreboard shows that in the first four innings, the Gorillas have scored 10, 28, 16 and 42 runs, which total 96. Yet in the ninth inning, the score is read out by the announcer and shown on the scoreboard as Bugs Bunny 96, Gas House Gorillas 95. What happened to the 96th run?